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Introduction

This guide is intended to provide a comprehensive description of the
encounter with The Stone Guard in Mogu'shan Vaults. It is targeted at anyone
who desires to understand the fight mechanics.

This guide is updated for World of Warcraft WoD 6.1.2.

The Stone Guard is the first encounter in the Mogu'shan Vaults raid
instance. The encounter is most likely the first you will experience in Tier
14 raiding, and while its mechanics are not overly complex, it is still
quite challenging.

On normal mode, the fight will mostly test your raid's ability to switch
targets and to react to simple mechanics, all while maintaining solid
healing.

3. Overview of the Fight

The Guardians have a shared health pool, and each Guardian has its own
individual energy bar. The Guardians gain energy when they are close to other
Guardians, and when a Guardian reaches maximum energy, it unleashes a very
damaging, raid-wide attack. Each Guardian has its own version of this
maximum-energy attack; these attacks are called Overloads.
Fortunately, at any given time, one of the Guardians is also providing
protection to the raid from its own maximum-energy attack, in the form of a
90% damage reduction from that attack.

Therefore, the main objective of the encounter is to control the order in
which the Guardian's energy bars fill up, by moving them close to, and away
from other Guardians, depending on which Guardian is applying the debuff.

A few seconds after a Guardian uses its maximum-energy attack, a new Guardian
will start applying its debuff, and it is this Guardian that you must get to
maximum energy.

This cycle continues until you defeat the Guardians.

Additionally, the Guardians have a few damaging abilities, which we will
also detail.

Finally, note that in 10-man and LFR, only 3 of the 4 Guardians are active
(which of the 4 are active is chosen at random each lockout), while in 25-man
all 4 are always active.

3.1. Video by Inner Sanctum

25-man Normal kill

25-man Heroic kill

4. Energy Generation

In their normal state, the Guardians are affected by Solid Stone,
which causes them to take 90% reduced damage, and not generate any energy. This
buff is removed if a Guardian is within 12 yards of another Guardian.

While a Guardian has the Solid Stone effect, their current energy decreases
slowly over time.

When they are within 12 yards of each other, the Guardians generate energy
at a rate of approximately 1.7 per second, regardless of what actions your
raid takes. As we mentioned above, it will be your goal throughout the fight
to often move Guardians together, and then apart, in order to control their
energy generation.

5. Abilities

Besides Solid Stone, mentioned above, all the Guardians have
an ability called Rend Flesh. Rend Flesh is a bleed effect that each
Guardian applies on its tank. It lasts 15 seconds and deals a moderate amount
of physical damage. This bleed effect does not stack. Overall, it is not
problematic.

In addition to this, each Guardian has its own set of 3 abilities. While
these are different for each Guardian, they can easily be categorised as
follows (Amethyst abilities are only used by the Amethyst Guardian, and so on).

Amethyst Petrification, Cobalt Petrification,
Jade Petrification and Jasper Petrification are the Petrification
abilities that one (and only one) of the Guardians will use per cycle. These
abilities apply a stacking debuff to the raid (it takes the form of a resource
bar that fills up to 100). If the Guardian manages to stack this debuff fully,
the raid will become paralyzed. The Petrification is broken by the Guardian's
Overload (explained below). Petrification also greatly reduces the damage
done by the respective Guardian's Overload. For example,
Amethyst Petrification only reduces the damage done by
Amethyst Overload, but not the damage done by Cobalt Overload.

5.1. Damaging Abilities

Amethyst Pool is cast by the Amethyst Guardian. It is a void zone,
placed at a random raid member's location, that inflicts Shadow damage ever
second to everyone inside it. It lasts 1 minute and 20 seconds, and it is cast
roughly once every 5-10 seconds.

Cobalt Mine is cast by the Cobalt Guardian. It is a cobalt shard
launched at a random raid member's location. After 3 seconds, the shard
becomes active, and any player who comes within 7 yards of it causes it to
detonate, dealing Arcane damage to all allies within 7 yards, also rooting
them for 6 seconds. This is ability is cast every 10 seconds.

Jade Shards is cast by the Jade Guardian. It is a raid-wide nuke,
dealing a small amount of Nature damage to all players. This spell is cast
every 10 seconds.

Jasper Chains is cast by the Jasper Guardian. It links two random
raid members together (indicated graphically by chains). If the two players
are more than 10 yards apart from one another, the chains deal Fire damage to
them every second. The damage is increased by 15% (10% in LFR) for each second
that the two players are more than 10 yards apart, and being more than 10
yards apart for 15 seconds removes the chains. Note that this effect is
cumulative, meaning that you do not need to be apart for 15 continuous seconds;
for each second that you are apart you get a stack of an otherwise harmless
debuff, and at 15 stacks the chains are broken. The spell is cast roughly every
10 seconds.

5.2. Petrification

Petrification is an ability that Guardians possess, but only one of the
Guardians can cast its Petrification ability at one time. It is a stacking
debuff (although it appears on players' screen as a distinct resource bar)
that is applied on the entire raid. Petrification reduces the target's movement
speed with each stack. If the debuff reaches maximum, it
paralyzes its targets.

Petrification has a maximum capacity of 100, and it takes around 80 seconds
for it to reach maximum capacity.

Petrification is cast for the first time 5 seconds into the fight, and
again 5 seconds after each Petrification ends.

A random Guardian is selected to cast Petrification each time, and the
same Guardian cannot cast petrification twice in a row. There seems to be a
tendency for the Guardian with the lowest energy to be chosen to petrify the
raid, but we cannot confirm this.

While Petrification is stacking on players, they take 90% reduced damage
from the school of damage belonging to the respective Guardian

Reaching maximum Petrification can only be prevented by the Guardian's
Overload (see below), and not by another Guardian's Overload. For example,
Cobalt Overload does not remove Amethyst Petrification.

Reaching maximum Petrification causes all players to become unable to move
or act. They continue to take damage, meaning that it always leads to a
wipe.

It is important to differentiate between the two Petrification states:

The first represents the fact that one of the Guardians is applying the
debuff to the raid, reducing damage taken from their school of damage.

The second represents Petrification at maximum capacity, when the raid is
stunned. This second effect must always be avoided.

5.3. Overload

Overload is the final ability of the Guardians. Overload is only cast when
the Guardian reaches 100 energy. It deals a large amount of damage of the
Guardian's school, and stops Petrification.

5 seconds after Overload breaks a Petrification, a new Petrification
begins. An Overload from a Guardian other than the one who is currently
petrifying the raid will have no effect whatsoever on the Petrification.

6. Strategy

The strategy for defeating The Stone Guard revolves around two concepts:

Each Guardian who casts Petrification must overload (reach 100 energy)
before he finishes petrifying.

Do not allow Overloads to take place without the respective Guardian's
Petrification being active. For example, Amethyst Overload should not
happen without the raid being protected by Amethyst Petrification.

This means that the Guardians will have to often be moved close and away
from one another, in such a way that the petrifying Guardian is always within
12 yards of another Guardian (so that he gains energy, in order to overload).
At the same time, you should minimise the amount of energy that non-petrifying
Guardians get, by rotating which of them is in close proximity of the
petrifying Guardian.

6.1. Positioning

In 10-man and LFR, you should have two locations for tanking the
Guardians. In one location, your off-tank should keep a Guardian that is
not casting petrification, while in the other, your main tank should keep the
petrifying Guardian together with the lowest-energy Guardian.

In 25-man, you should have three tanking locations. This will allow you to
only have two Guardians (of the 4 active) gain any energy. This requires
using 3 tanks.

The Guardians only have to be more than 12 yards apart in order not to gain
energy, so it is advised not to have the two tanking locations too far
apart.

The rest of your raid members should stand close together near the center
of the room. There are two important positioning challenges for your raid
members.

Raid members must be quick to move out of Amethyst Pool whenever it
spawns underneath them.

Raid members must be quick to move away from Cobalt Mines when they
are placed next to them.

Finally, Jasper Chains also requires that the affected raid members
move, which can cause some interactions with the abilities mentioned above,
although it should not be problematic.

None of the other abilities of the Guardians pose any positional
problems.

It is important to keep in mind that as Petrification stacks higher and
higher, movement speed is progressively reduced. This makes moving out
Amethyst Pools or away from Cobalt Mines more difficult.

6.1.1. Taunting and Positioning the Guardians

The energy generation of the Guardians is determined entirely by their
positioning, so it is up to the tanks to make sure that the strategy of the
encounter is executed properly. We believe that it is optimal, for several
reasons, for the tanks to remain stationary in the pre-assigned tanking
locations, and to simply perform taunt switches between them, whenever a
Guardian must be moved.

Tanks must expect to taunt Guardians roughly every 20 seconds, which is
neither problematic in terms of the cooldown of taunt, nor in terms of the
diminishing returns of taunt.

The tanking locations we provided in the previous section are approximate,
of course, since tanks will sometimes have to move, due to the location of
Amethyst Pools or other damaging abilities.

6.2. Guardian Energy Management

The principle for managing the energy of Guardians optimally can best be
summarised as always have the petrifying Guardian next to the Guardian
with the lowest amount of energy.

The best strategy is to rotate the Guardians, always moving the petrifying
Guardian next to the lowest non-petrifying Guardian. The ideal time to move
the Guardians is every 25 energy in 25-man, and every 50 energy in 10-man and
LFR.

Naturally, when you find yourself in a situation where the energy of the
non-petrifying Guardian you are currently using is less than or equal to the
energy of the other non-petrifying Guardian(s), you should maintain the
status-quo, for convenience. This is because you will need to choose a
non-petrifying Guardian to gain more energy than the other(s) anyway, so it
might as well be the one you are currently next to.

6.3. Dealing with Mechanics

The encounter checks if your raid members are able to react accordingly to
a number of abilities, while maintaining the required amounts of DPS, HPS, and
threat. In this section, we will go through each ability and the way in which
it should be dealt with.

6.3.1. Amethyst Pool

Amethyst Pool is simply avoided by stepping out of it. As the fight
goes on, the floor of the room will become increasingly covered by the pools,
but finding safe spots should not be an issue.

This ability can interact with Cobalt Mine, which can root players in
place. We will detail this in the section below.

6.3.2. Cobalt Mine

Cobalt Mine should be avoided by moving away from the crystal
shard. However, since the floor of the room can become quite crowded, your raid
may opt to detonate some mines on purpose (while making sure that no one
except the detonating player is within 7 yards of the crystal).

When the Mine is detonated, it damages and roots all players within 7 yards
of it. The root effect lasts for 6 seconds, and is dispellable. The root effect
can interact negatively with Amethyst Pools, preventing players from
moving out of the pool. In this case, healers should be quick to dispel and
heal the affected players.

The ideal time to detonate the Cobalt Mines is when Cobalt Petrification
is being cast, since this reduces the damage that they deal by 90%, making them
practically harmless.

If the room becomes too crowded with all the Cobalt Mines, and you cannot
wait for a Cobalt Petrification, certain players can detonate them on purpose
and take minimal damage. Ideal examples are Hunters using
Deterrence, Shadow Priests using Dispersion, or any other
classes with immunities or large damage reduction abilities. Make sure that no
one else is within 7 yards of a mine that is about to be detonated.

6.3.3. Jasper Chains

Jasper Chains links two random players together. In order for the chains
to disappear, the players must stand 10 yards away from each other for 15
seconds. However, standing at this distance causes the chains to deal
damage to the two players, so this is not always the best option.

There is no other way to get rid of the chains.

We advise your raid to implement a "buddy system" for handling the
Jasper Chains. In short, the system relies on not breaking the Jasper Chains
that link two players, and having the two players stand close to each other
for the rest of the fight. This is made possible by the fact that there is a
limit to how many chains can be active at one time (3 in 10-man; unknown yet
in 25-man), meaning that your raid will only have to control a few buddy
pairs.

The system we propose works as follows. Every time two players are linked
by chains, they become each other's buddy. The two players should
always stand next to each other (within 10 yards), and move together
throughout the remainder of the fight.

Since it is problematic if a healer and a melee DPS are linked together,
undesirable links can be broken while there is a Jasper Petrification
going on (since the damage the chains deal will be vastly reduced). Your raid
can continue to do this until favourable links are formed (melee DPS with melee
DPS, healer with ranged DPS).

Alternatively, it is possible for your raid to pre-assign buddies, and
break all chains (during Jasper Petrification) that do not correspond to these
buddies. This is easier to organize beforehand, but it may result in too much
confusion during the encounter.

As we mentioned earlier in the guide, the linked players do not need to
spend 15 consecutive seconds apart - this effect is cumulative, so they can
simply move in and out of range of each other and still eventually break the
chains.

6.4. Sources of Damage

Random avoidable single or multiple target damage to players from
Cobalt Mine.

Avoidable damage from players standing in the void zones created by
Amethyst Pool.

Varying damage from Jasper Chains, depending on the strategy your
raid is using.

High raid-wide damage from overloads, each time a Guardian reaches 100
energy (roughly 200,000 damage after reductions).

A situation of particular interest occurs when a player is rooted by
Cobalt Mine while inside a void zone from Amethyst Pool. In this
case, that player must quickly be dispelled so that he can move out.

6.5. Cleaving and Multi-Dotting

Since two Guardians will always be tanked together, classes with cleave
effects (Arms Warriors, Combat Rogues) or DoTs (Warlocks, Shadow Priests,
Balance Druids) can boost their (and the raid's) DPS greatly by taking
advantage of the situation.

These techniques are highly advised, especially since the Guardians have a
shared health pool.

7. When to Use Heroism/Bloodlust/Time Warp

The fight does not have different phases, nor does its difficulty change
as it goes on. Therefore, you should use
Heroism/Bloodlust/Time Warp at the start of the fight, to
maximise the benefit of players' potions and initial cooldowns.

8. Learning the Fight

As the encounter is stable in difficulty, and no new phases are unlocked by
reaching a certain stage of the fight, the best way for your raid to learn the
fight is to ensure that everyone understands fully how to handle each of the
mechanics individually.

In addition to this, all that your raid must know is what the basic
mechanics of the fight are (Guardian energy generation, petrification and
overloads).

9. Heroic Mode

The Heroic mode of The Stone Guard is an introductory Heroic mode, probably
the first one your raid will attempt in Tier 14. While the encounter is
quite difficult (as all Heroic modes are), it is also reasonably accessible for
a well geared and well coordinated group. Moreover, the encounter will be
easy for your raid to learn, as it does not differ greatly from the Normal
mode version.

9.1. Differences from Normal Mode

As mentioned, the fight does not differ greatly from Normal mode. Your raid
will have to contend with increased health and damage from the bosses, as well
as with a few new fight mechanics.

9.1.1. Increased Damage

In Heroic mode, the Guardians all have greatly increased health pools. This
aspect turns the fight into somewhat of a DPS race, but this is made trivial
by the Heroic-only mechanic of the encounter.

In addition to this, every single mechanic in the encounter deals
significantly more damage than in Normal mode. This includes the melee attacks
of the Guardians.

9.1.2. New Mechanics

The novelty of the Heroic mode of the encounter stems from the interaction
between your raid, the tiles that make up the room's floor, and several
crystals that are present in the room. By executing the strategy properly,
your raid will benefit from a buff that will greatly increase your DPS and
Spirit, allowing you to better handle the boss' increased health and
damage.

In order to obtain this buff, several of your raid members will have to
interact with crystals present around the room, and subsequently stand on
specific areas of the floor.

For each active Guardian, there is a crystal located in the room. In 10-man,
where only 3 Guardians are active, there are only 3 crystals. These crystals
are unattackable, and they do nothing on their own. When a raid member
interacts with a crystal (by clicking it in melee range), they (the raid
member) gains a debuff. This debuff deals damage to the affected raid member,
but it also allows them to subsequently buff the raid. The debuff depends on
which crystal the raid member interacts with, but the only difference between
the crystals is the school of magic damage that they deal.

Interacting with a crystal, therefore, adds the respective debuff to the
player. The debuff lasts 30 seconds, and starts out with a number of stacks
when it is first applied (10 stacks in 10-man, and 7 stacks
in 25-man). These stacks are progressively lost. For each stack, the player
takes a small amount of damage every second. Even though the damage dealt per
stack is rather low, the players will take high damage after having just
clicked the crystals, since the stacks will be at their highest.

The next part of the mechanics involves the floor tiles. Whenever a raid
member who is affected by a debuff from a crystal walks on a floor tile, this
tile becomes energized, and a stack of their debuff is removed. Indeed, there
are two types of floor tiles, according to the in-game classification.

White Floor Tiles are the all of the tiles that make up the floor
of the room. This excludes the central area, which is of a darker colour, and
is also partly covered by a carpet. White Floor Tiles do not do anything on
their own; this is the default state of the floor, which is modified by
debuffed players stepping on them.

Energized Tiles are White Floor Tiles that have been stepped
on by players affected by a debuff from a crystal. Energized Tiles glow
brightly, and for each one your raid gains a stack of Energized Tiles.

Energized Tiles increases the damage done and Spirit of all your raid
members by 1% per stack. The buff has a 10-minute duration, however all the
current Energized Tiles are reset by the bosses when they reach 75% and 40%
health.

Finally, the energy of Guardians no longer decreases when they have the
Solid Stone effect active.

9.2. Strategy

The strategy for the Heroic mode is very simple and straightforward. In
addition to performing all of the Normal mode tasks, the heroic strategy can
be easily summarised.

Have several raid members take the debuffs from the crystals, and energize
White Floor Tiles around the room.

Stop energizing tiles at around 100 stacks of Energized Tiles, and
simply focus on DPS the bosses.

After the Energized Tiles are reset at 75% and 40%, re-energize them until
you have about 100 stacks of Energized Tiles.

9.2.1. Energizing Tiles

For the most part, it is the task of your DPS players to energize the floor
tiles, since tanks and healers cannot move freely (due to the importance of
performing their own roles). The number of DPS players who will go around
energizing floor tiles depends on how well your raid can cope with the damage
that these players will take from their respective debuffs, but the faster
you reach your desired level of Energized Tiles, the better.

To remind you, at full stacks (10 in 10-man, and 7 in 25-man), the affected
raid members will be taking around 60,000 damage per second. Therefore, coupled
with the damage that the tanks are taking, this results in a lot of damage
that must be healed. Therefore, you will need to judge how many players you can
afford to have energizing tiles, based on your own experiences. In any case,
the players who are energizing tiles can use their own defensive cooldowns to
help mitigate the damage.

Additionally, it may be possible for healers to help out with energizing
tiles, which can be useful.

Finally, do not forget that floor tiles will have to be re-energized at
75% and 40% of the bosses' health.

To avoid confusion, there are a few aspects we would like to mention
regarding the practice of energizing tiles.

It is not feasible (or required) to only use the crystal of the currently
petrifying Guardian. Even though this will greatly reduce the damage that
players take from interacting with the crystals, it will result in far too
slow energizing of the tiles.

In order to energize a tile, as mentioned above, all you must do is to run
over it.

As a point of reference, 100 energized tiles are less than half of the
room's tiles.

9.2.2. Other Concerns

Aside from energizing the floor tiles, nothing is different from the Normal
mode of the encounter. Keep in mind, however, that all mechanics are far more
punishing in Heroic mode, and your raid will have to execute the strategy
flawlessly in order to succeed.

10. Achievement: Must Love Dogs

The Must Love Dogs achievement is part of the
Glory of the Pandaria Raider meta achievement. It is a very simple
achievement for your raid. It simply requires that each one of your raid
members is accompanied by a canine non-combat pet (companion) when
defeating The Stone Guard.

We currently know of the following viable canine companions (based on a
comment on Wowhead):

11. Concluding Remarks

This concludes the guide to defeating The Stone Guard. As you can see, the
encounter is quite straightforward, and it acts well as an
introductory fight to the raid instance, and raiding in general in Tier
14. If you have any feedback, questions or suggestions, or if you simply wish
to share your experiences on this fight with us and the rest of the community,
we invite you to contact us on our forums, or by e-mail.